Fortunate Son

by J. D. Rhoades

  “Get goin’, little brother.” Tyler’s feet didn’t seem to want to obey him. He felt the gun barrel in the small of his back. “Move.” He began to shuffle, then picked up the pace as he felt a second, harder nudge. His hand shook as he opened the screen door. There was a hand-lettered paper sign on the wooden interior door: SHOPLIFTERS! THESE PREMESES UNDER VIDEO SURVELLANCE. WE PROSECUTE. He hesitated again, then turned the knob.

  Inside, the place was cramped, with aisles of candy and gum racks to his right, leading to the upright glass-doored coolers of beer and sodas that lined two walls. Neon signs for Budweiser, Rolling Rock, and Schlitz over the coolers provided more illumination than the wan fluorescent fixtures in the ceiling. To Tyler’s left, a long counter took up the other wall, stacked with countertop displays for lottery tickets and vapor cigarette supplies. Behind the counter, a balding middle-aged man was slumped on a high-back wooden stool, head down, hands crossed over his ample belly. He looked up suddenly as Mick nudged Tyler closer, blinking as if suddenly awakened. His eyes grew wide as he took in the guns. He jumped off the stool as Mick elbowed Tyler aside.

  “Don’t do nothin’ stupid, old man,” Mick said. “Hands up where I can see ’em.”

  The man looked back and forth from Mick to Tyler, mouth opening and closing like a fish’s. “I’m sorry,” Tyler said softly.

  “Shut up,” Mick said. He moved closer to the counter, holding the gun in front of him at arm’s length, wrist rotated so the butt was parallel to the floor, the way Tyler had seen gunmen hold their weapons in the movies. “Open the cash drawer,” he barked. “Hurry up, goddamn it, I ain’t got all fuckin’ day.”

  The man’s expression of shock and fear turned to a scowl. “You cain’t talk like that in here.”

  Mick halted. “Seriously? Seriously?” He pulled the trigger.

  THE ROAR OF the pistol in the small space nearly deafened Tyler. He screamed and came close to dropping his own gun. The sideways position in which Mick was holding his weapon may have looked impressive on a movie screen, but it pulled the barrel upwards and the bullet went over the counterman’s head, shattering the plastic cigarette rack behind him. The man screamed as well, his voice high and shrill like a woman’s. He ducked behind the counter, a cascade of cigarette packs falling like leaves on top of him.

  Mick leaped onto the counter, swung his legs over, and slid into the narrow space. Tyler heard the man scream again as Mick stomped down. “Stay down, you old fuck.” He reached over and opened the register. “Keith,” he snapped. “Get over here.” He clawed a sheaf of bills from the drawer and looked at Tyler. “Keith!” he shouted. “Come take this money!”

  That’s not my name, Tyler wanted to say, but Mick aimed the gun at the old man who lay whimpering on the floor. The threat was unmistakable. Tyler walked over, his eyes stinging with tears of frustration, and took the bills from Mick’s hand. He noticed the black glassy eye of a small video camera behind and above the counter, focused on where he stood. He realized that this, not the money, was the point of the whole exercise. He needed to be seen on tape, with a gun in one hand and money in the other. He looked over at Mick, and the smug grin on his older brother’s face fell away as he saw the hate in Tyler’s eyes. Mick looked down at the old man, his gun hand never wavering.

  “Don’t,” Tyler said, hating the pleading sound in his breaking voice. “Please.”

  “Please,” the man on the floor echoed.

  Mick seemed about to speak, then something caught his eye. He reached beneath the counter and pulled out a stubby shotgun with no stock and a pistol grip. “Well, well, old man,” he said, his voice nearly purring. “What we got here? Were you thinkin’, maybe, of being a hero with this here scatter-gun?”

  “No…no, I swear it.”

  It felt to Tyler like they’d been in the cramped store, the air thick with the smell of fear, for days. “Come on. Let’s go. Please.”

  Mick was still looking down. “I think you’re lyin’, old man. I think you were gonna wait till I was on my way out, then blow my ass away. Maybe come out shootin’ at my brother and me. That the plan, Stan?”

  The old man had gone beyond speech. He just sobbed and whimpered like a whipped dog.

  Mick slid back over the counter, pistol in one hand, shotgun in the other. The smug look was back. “Let’s go.”

  SAVANNAH HEARD the front door slam and rose from the bed, her arms and stomach still aching from the beating. Charleyboy was in the living room, just flinging himself down in the creaky recliner.

  “Hey,” she said softly.

  He didn’t look at her. “Hey.” He didn’t sound angry any more. He sounded ashamed. Some of the tension went out of her. This was the beginning of the reconciliation, a ritual to her as familiar as the sunset. “You want something to eat?”

  He picked up the TV remote and switched the set on. “Yeah. Thanks.”

  She went in the kitchen, found the last of the ham and a few eggs. She was standing at the stove, scrambling the eggs, the coffee maker gurgling away, when she felt him behind her. He slid his arms around her from behind and pulled her back against him. He buried his face in the hair covering her neck and kissed her there. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I’m so sorry.”

  He sounded so much like a little boy, she felt the tears spring to her eyes. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him it was all right, but she leaned back against him. “Go sit at the table,” she murmured. “It’s almost ready.” He gave her a final squeeze, then released her.

  She made them both plates and took them to the table, then went and fetched the coffee. They ate in silence for a few moments until he spoke again. “I know I shouldn’t have lost it like that.”

  She was still looking down at her plate. “You hurt me, Charleyboy. Why do you hurt me like that?”

  He put down his fork and rubbed his face with one hand. “I know. I know. I’m tryin’ to do better. I’m just all torn up and twisted inside. But I’ll make it up to you. I swear it.”

  She looked up at him, her anger rising. “How? What do you think you can do that makes up for you punchin’ and kickin’ me like I was a goddamn dog?”

  He picked up his fork and took a bite, looking down sullenly at his plate. “I said I was sorry,” he mumbled.

  She sighed, knowing not to push it. “You want more coffee?”

  He shook his head. “When we get to California, things’ll be different. I promise. We won’t have all this shit hanging over us. I got somethin’ in the works that’ll get us out from under Mr. Luther.”

  She shuddered at the mention of the name. She’d only met the old man once, but that was enough. The way he’d looked at her made her feel like a rabbit being sized up by a snake. “That doesn’t make me feel any better. I don’t trust that old bastard.”

  “I don’t either. But he trusts me. And…well, that’s all I’m going to say about it. For now.” He smiled at her, the smile that had always melted her before. “You trust me, don’t you, baby girl?”

  It almost worked. But she could tell he was up to something. He had a plan. That scared her. Angus Charlebois’s plans over the past few years hadn’t had a history of working out well.

  “Yeah,” she lied. “I trust you.”

  Later, as she’d known he would, he took her to bed. Usually, the make-up sex was the hottest, but this time her fear and apprehension muted her own responses. She did the things and said the words she knew would get him to his peak quickly, and when he was done and whispered “I love you,” she whispered it back. But when he was asleep, snoring softly, she lay awake looking at the ceiling. She thought of her boys. Maybe she could leverage what little she knew of Charleyboy’s plans to get Winslow more motivated to find them. And there was always the other thing. The searches she’d done online: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram…she had been to dozens of Internet support groups for parents trying to find their adopted children. She’d been intrigued by the stories of the ones who’d located them online. S
o she’d signed up for everything she could think of, waded through the dozens of creepy and occasionally obscene messages she was learning were the lot of every woman who put her face and name out on the Internet, and posted messages about looking for her sons.

  Her life hadn’t been anything close to stable to this point, but she’d built her survival strategy on her ability to read situations and plan ahead. She could sense changes coming that were going to be more cataclysmic than she’d known since the boys were taken from her. She made up her mind that, whatever happened, she was going to be standing when it was all over. And she was going to be doing it with her sons.

  “YOU COULD HAVE killed that guy,” Tyler said. He was sitting in the passenger seat of the Firebird, staring down at the pile of money in his lap. Mick had taken the pistol from him and stuck it in the backseat.

  Mick pressed down on the accelerator, making the car’s big engine roar. “Didn’t need to kill him, baby bro.” There was a giddy edge in his voice as if he was about to break into hysterical laughter. “I didn’t need to kill him. You know why?”

  Tyler didn’t want to know the reason; he knew it was something twisted. But he was afraid of Mick’s reaction if he didn’t answer. “Why?” he muttered.

  “Because I broke him.” Mick’s tight smile was like the arc of a cut throat. “Did you see him at the end there? The fat fuck would have done anything I wanted. Anything.”

  Tyler shut his eyes, wishing he were anywhere else, wishing Mick would just shut up. But the robbery had his older brother as high and jabbering as Tyler imagined a gram of coke would have. “There’s no feeling like that kind of power, Keith. Nothing.” He fell silent for a moment. Tyler stole a glance at him. He seemed suddenly deflated, slumped in the bucket seat. “Nothing.” The word came out as a haunted whisper.

  “What happened to you, Mick?” The words were out of his mouth before Tyler could stop them.

  Mick’s face, when it turned to him, was completely blank. “Nothing. Nothing happened to me.” He looked back at the road. “I just figured it out early on. Some people break. Some people do the breaking. It’s better to be the one who does the breaking.”

  Tyler didn’t know what to say to that. He looked out the window. It was getting dark outside. The miles were going by in a blur. “Where are we going?”

  “My place. To get a few things. Then we get back on the road.”

  “The road to where? What are we doing?”

  “I told you. We’re going to find our Mama.”

  “Mick,” Tyler said desperately, “how do you even know she wants to see us? And how are you going to find her?”

  “I know because she’s been looking for us, Keith. She wants to see us. Both of us. And I think she’s in trouble. I’ll explain it all when we get to the house.” He smiled, and it was the first smile Tyler had seen from him that didn’t terrify him. “Boy, is Mama going to be surprised when she finds out her boys are back together again.”

  “WYATT.” GLENDA’S voice came to him through a heavy mist of sleep, barely penetrating to his waking mind at first. He grunted and tried to burrow his head into the pillow and dive back down into sleep.

  “Wyatt.” This time she had a hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently.

  He grumbled this time and moved to brush the hand away. He stopped at the last moment and opened his eyes. The morning sun was slanting through the blinds of the guest room. He’d stumbled drunkenly into the room sometime after midnight, retaining enough consideration to not want to wake his wife up with the buzz-saw snoring he knew he’d be doing after a day and a night of drinking. He raised his head slightly from the pillow and glanced at the clock: 9:46 am. Damn. In his working days, he’d never slept past six thirty, even on the weekends. It had been a habit instilled by his father, who’d lived his whole life by the Marine clock, rousting the whole family out of bed at five o’clock. When he’d gone out on his own, six thirty seemed like an incredible, guilty luxury. Now look at me, he thought, and that made him sit up. The motion made him wince with the sudden throbbing in his head. Glenda silently held out a pair of aspirin tablets, a glass of water in her other hand. He popped the aspirin into his mouth, then took the water before he saw the look on her face. “What?” he tried to say, the tablets still on his tongue making it come out as “Ot?”

  She motioned for him to drink. The bitter taste of the crumbling tablets provided further encouragement. He downed them with a swallow of water, which set off a spasm of hacking that nearly doubled him over. When Wyatt was finally able to straighten up, Glenda was still regarding him with a thin-lipped look he didn’t like. “There’s someone here to see you.”

  He massaged his aching temples. “Who?”

  She turned away. “You might want to comb your hair. And brush your teeth. Your breath smells awful.”

  So whoever it was had Glenda wound up pretty tight. Wyatt went into the other room and hastily pulled on a pair of ragged jeans. A look in the mirror made him nearly groan with despair. His blue eyes were watery and vague, rimmed and veined with red. His black hair, once thick and full even as it slowly became streaked with gray, was now thinning and lank. His skin looked like sandpaper, and he realized he hadn’t shaved yesterday. He quickly washed his face, brushed the gummy film from his teeth, and used a brush to bring some semblance of order to his hair before pulling on a faded NC State T-shirt and heading downstairs. The scent of coffee wafted up to meet him as he descended, and he was suddenly awake. When he got to the kitchen door, however, what he saw made him stop short.

  She was sitting at the kitchen island, both hands wrapped around one of his big ceramic mugs. She looked up as he came in and smiled. It was a smile he remembered well, even when he hadn’t wanted to. “Hey, Wyatt,” she said.

  “Uh. Hum.” He realized how ridiculous he must sound. “Hey, Kass.” You look good, he wanted to say, but a glance over to where Glenda was putting something in the oven stopped him.

  It was true, though. There were laugh lines around the blue eyes and the full lips he remembered all too well. There were also some streaks of gray in the blonde hair gathered back into the long braid he also remembered, but Kassidey Emmerich was still a striking woman. He realized she was speaking. “Sorry to get you up,” she said. “I never knew you to sleep this late.”

  The stove door banged, making him jump. But when he looked over at Glenda, she had a smile of such perfect serenity on her face that anyone who didn’t know her like Wyatt did would have thought she meant it. “Whoops,” she said. “Biscuits’ll be ready in two shakes. I can cook up some sausage and eggs to go in them, won’t take a minute.”

  “Oh, that’s fine,” Kassidey said. “I don’t eat meat.”

  “She doesn’t eat meat,” Wyatt said at the same time, then grimaced with embarrassment.

  “Oh.” The smile slipped a little. “I guess that’s how you keep that figure.” There was an uncomfortable silence until Glenda broke it. “Do you eat butter, then? You’re not one of those, what do you call them…”

  “Vegans,” Kassidey said. “And no. Butter would be great. I hate to put you out like this.”

  “It’s no trouble. At all.” She looked at Wyatt. “Coffee’s ready. I’ll be back in a minute.” As she walked past Wyatt and out of the kitchen, he could feel the tension in her. He sighed and went to pour himself a cup. He turned back to Kassidey. She grimaced.

  “Well, that wasn’t awkward. At all.”

  “This kind of is.”

  She nodded. “I know.” She took a sip from her mug. “Your wife makes really good tea.”

  “What do you want, Kass?” The words came out more harshly than he intended.

  She put the mug down. “I know Carl Welch came to see you yesterday. About Tyler and Mick.”

  He nodded. “Yeah. I told him there was nothing I could do.”

  “You sure about that?”

  He noticed that his hands were trembling as they held the cup. He didn’t know if it was
anger or alcohol. “I’m not a law enforcement officer anymore.”

  “I know. But the ones who are supposed to be doing the job aren’t any help. And,” she hesitated, “it just got worse.”

  He brought the cup to his lips, willing his hands not to spill the hot liquid on him. It almost worked. A little of the hot coffee spilled down his chin. He set the cup down on the kitchen island. He didn’t want to ask, but he couldn’t help himself.

  She spoke first. “Mick and Tyler just robbed a country store in Spencer. There’s video. Tyler…Tyler had a gun in his hand.”

  “OH NO.” GLENDA was back, standing in the kitchen door. “Does Carl know?”

  Kassidey nodded. “Henry told him.” Her mouth tightened. “With his usual delicacy and tact.”

  “We need to call him, Wyatt,” Glenda said. She looked at Kassidey. “How’s he taking it?” Her earlier prickliness had been set aside.

  “Well, you know Carl. Better than I do. He’s putting all his energy into looking after Marian. She wasn’t handling Tyler’s disappearance well as it was. And this…” She shook her head. “After Henry came by, she took to her bed. She hasn’t left it since.”

  Glenda looked incredulous. “Surely Henry doesn’t think Tyler did this willingly?”

  Before Kassidey answered, Wyatt broke in. “He can’t discount it. Not without knowing more.” He turned to Kassidey. “Tyler had a gun in his hand?”

  “Wyatt!” Glenda’s voice was outraged.

  Kassidey reached over and fished in the bag that she’d slung on the back of her chair. She pulled out a cell phone that looked as big as a brick. “I have the video.” She grimaced. “It was on the local news this morning.”